MEMORIES

Thomas M. Pickford

“The trooper asked if either one of them could handle a gun. When Pickford answered yes, the trooper gave him a shotgun and a handful of shells and told them to divert sightseers away from the damaged area while he responded to the looting problem.”

Thomas M. Pickford had just returned home from the Shawnee Country Club, where he had been watching a state golf championship until lightning posed a threat, when his wife, Pat, told him WIBW-TV announcer Bill Kurtis said to take cover because a tornado was heading into Topeka.

Pickford knew Kurtis because he had been his commanding officer in the 151st Marine Corps Rifle Co. If Kurtis was issuing an alert, he knew the storm must be serious.

Pickford, his wife and their four children, ages 4 to 13, left their house at 2824 Burnett Road and walked to the home of their neighbors, Dave and Mary Huntsman. Before going to the basement, the men watched the storm from the front porch, looking westward.

“It was a big gray mass,” Pickford said. “There was no debris flying, so it hadn’t been on the ground long.”

The tornado rose up and went over the top of the Huntsman home, causing the structure to sway under its force. At both homes, shingles were ripped from the roof and windows were broken.

“But when we looked to the south, there was nothing there — no houses, and we saw people coming up out of their basements. I thought thousands must be dead,” he said.

Pickford and Dave Huntsman walked two blocks toward the obliterated residential area at S.W. 29th and Gage before a Kansas Highway Patrol trooper pulled up in his car and told them people were parking along Interstate 470 and stealing items from the rubble. The trooper asked if either one of them could handle a gun. When Pickford answered yes, the trooper gave him a shotgun and a handful of shells and told them to divert sightseers away from the damaged area while he responded to the looting problem.

They left their posts when the trooper returned about an hour later. Pickford hadn’t been home long before he received a call from his boss at Armco Steel, now Con-Tech, where he worked as district engineer, saying the twister had damaged the plant. He said the force of the tornado had moved 1-ton railroad cars more than two blocks and tossed pipes weighing 300 to 400 pounds across the area like pick-up sticks.

“I was put in charge of seeing if the pipes had damaged property and arranging to pick them up,” he said. “I did this for two days.”

The farthest report of scattered Armco materials was a culvert — 36 inches in diameter and 20 feet long — found north of Topeka.